Hi all,
somehow I managed to enrage the gods Odin and Poseidon
(responsible for all kinds of storms depending on your
geographic position). After my last year's SV9CVY storm
desaster (10 hours without electricity) this year my
sentence was: 7.5 hours without antennas...
I was operating Single OP (Assisted) at DJ6QT's station
[while DJ6QT was at CT9L, and my home station was operated
by my friend Tobi DH1TW], when Mr. Edward B. Murphy had his
executive officer "Jeanette" look up my place. Obviously she
found that my 5.4 million points at that time were enough.
Sunday at 1627z she knocked over the 60 ft tower holding
the 4-ele Quad for 10/15/20 - just in the middle of a very
nice stateside run on 10 meters. That was a good hit.
Her boss had already played with the 2-ele Quad on the 130 ft
tower. This antenna had two fullsize (wire) elements for
10/15/20 and 40 meters and also held a slightly shortened
loop for 80 meters. He had fun breaking wire after wire and
taking away band after band from me...
After Sunday 1627z there was only one antenna left: the
Inverted L for 160 meters. During the last 7.5 hours I could
only squeeze out 197 QSOs from that band. So I ended up with
just 5.6 million points instead of some 7 million, when I
had been able to finish the contest *WITH* antennas...
Next year I will be looking for a GUARANTEED-STORM-FREE-PLACE
OR-MY-MONEY-BACK. Any ideas? ;-)
P.S.: "Jeanette" was the name of the storm...
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Call: DL6FBL (@DJ6QT)
Class: Single OP / All Bands (Assisted)
QSO Z CTY
=======================
1.8 348 10 59
3.5 267 15 78
7 332 27 105
14 575 36 143
21 878 37 143
28 706 37 155
=======================
All 3106 162 683 => 5,601,505
Rig: Icom IC-775DSP + Ameritron AL-1500
Kenwood TS-850S + Acom 2000A
160m: Inverted L with 2 elevated radials
80m: 1-ele Loop @ 40m (rotatable)
40m: 2-ele Quad @ 40m + Sloper -> East
20m: 2-ele Quad @ 40m + 4-ele Quad @ 18m
15m: 2-ele Quad @ 40m + 4-ele Quad @ 18m
10m: 2-ele Quad @ 40m + 4-ele Quad @ 18m
Two Beverages (open ends) to 50°/230° and 100°/280°
[sorry no stateside on 160m, "just" VY2ZM...]
IBM Thinkpad A31 (P4/1.6GHz) [Win 2000 Server + Writelog v10.36G]
(YES, the soundcard fully supports Writelog, and YES, it still
has one serial port, and YES, you can use HP-made USB-to-serial
adapters attached to an external USB hub, and YES, you cannot
attach a PS/2 keyboard/mouse, but have to get a new external
USB keyboard and USB mouse, and better attach the keyboard to
an onboard USB interface instead of a port on the external hub ;-)
* Voicekeyer: Writelog (integrated notebook soundcard)
* WX0B StackMatches on 40m thru 10m
* Homemade 6-in/2-out Relay Box
* SO2R by W5XD/K5DJ MultiKeyer and
* two TopTen Device Band Decoders
Packet cluster over GPRS (Telekom T-D1) on a Motorola Timeport
260 GSM mobile phone (connected to DB0SUE, tnx, very reliable!)
The setup was operable almost fully automated by PC keyboard
and mouse. The only manual actions were: tuning the Ameritron
amplifier after a band change on the running station, selecting
antennas on the StackMatches and switching between the main
antenna and the two Beverages on the low bands...
VY TNX to Walter, DJ6QT, for letting me use his station.
Too bad that there are "some" repairs pending...
73 Ben
DL6FBL
Bernd Och
BOC Computersysteme GmbH · Christian-Wirth-Str. 18 · 36043 Fulda
[T] 0661/9440-201 · [F] 0661/9440-100 · [E] bernd.och@boc.de
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